DOCSLIB.ORG

Religion and Faith – the Forgotten Factor of the Civil War

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Religion and Faith – the Forgotten Factor of the Civil War Civil War Book Review Spring 2019 Article 3 Religion and Faith – the Forgotten Factor of the Civil War Robert J. Miller [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/cwbr Recommended Citation Miller, Robert J. (2019) "Religion and Faith – the Forgotten Factor of the Civil War," Civil War Book Review: Vol. 21 : Iss. 2 . DOI: 10.31390/cwbr.21.2.03 Available at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/cwbr/vol21/iss2/3 Miller: Religion and Faith – the Forgotten Factor of the Civil War Feature Essay Religion and Faith – the Forgotten Factor of the Civil War Winter 2019 In 1861, the world’s most devout country went to war. Soldiers and civilians alike “read the same Bible, prayed to the same God and invoked His aide against the other.” In the antebellum era, organized faith and religion were easily the most important social and cultural values at work in America. Membership in churches grew from 1 in 15 to 1 in 7 Americans. The Second Great Awakening had led to the most prolific period of church growth in world history after the 1st century. Even the non-religious Abraham Lincoln said to an aide, “take all of [the Bible] upon reason that you can, and the balance upon faith, and you will live and die a happier and better man.” Though not a “war of religion,” America’s Civil War truly was a religious war. Yet today, the role that religion and faith played for the average soldier is unknown to most Civil War aficionados. The life and battles of Civil War soldiers are re-enacted precisely, written about thoroughly, discussed passionately, argued endlessly – yet faith is generally ignored. But religion and faith indeed enflamed, instigated and even help caused our deadliest American conflict. First, Civil War soldiers came from a deeply religious country. From its beginning, the United States was awash in a sea of faith, with religion playing an immense role in the founding of our states and country. Religious dissident Pilgrims, Deist Enlightenment founders, and Great Awakening preachers all were powerful shapers of the Revolutionary Era culture which birthed the Civil War generation. One French visitor to America said that religion was “the foremost of the political institutions” in early America. As the Civil War began, this had not changed, and because of the Second Great Awakening, America had become a society rampant with religious beliefs and attitudes. No antebellum group had as much power to regularly influence the number of citizens as American clergy did. As George Marsden aptly says, “American history recounted without its religious history is like Moby Dick without the whale.” Second, America’s first moral encounter was the slavery issue. A moral “Great Paradox” lay at the roots of America’s founding - the development of both race-based slavery and ideals of “liberty and freedom for all” at the same time. In 1787, the Founders consciously marginalized the contentious slavery issue so that the 13 colonies could agree and sign our Constitution. Yet in just 50 years, the deceptive compromise of this “Great Paradox” led to a huge moral impasse, bringing about enormous divisions which demanded a horrible price for their eventual resolution. Its cost was the death of 623,000 Union and Confederate soldiers to harvest the bitter fruit of America’s tree of liberty – all because of the Founders’ one unresolved moral issue. • MO senator Thomas Hart Benton compared the unceasing prewar conflict over slavery to ancient Egypt’s plague of frogs. “You could not look upon the table but that there were frogs, you could not sit down at the banquet but there were frogs, you could not go to the bridal couch and lift the sheets but there were frogs!” It was the same way with “this black question, forever on the table, on the nuptial couch, everywhere!” Published by LSU Digital Commons, 2019 1 Civil War Book Review, Vol. 21, Iss. 2 [2019], Art. 3 Third, the Bible helped cause the Civil War. Postwar veterans recalled one soldier on a Richmond battlefield who died with his hand resting on these words of Psalm 23 - “Thy rod and staff they comfort me.” In 1861, the Bible was America’s most read and valued book. Printed and imported in massive quantities during the War, soldiers on both sides read and carried the Scriptures in many forms. In a predominantly Calvinist America, the Bible was truly the national book par excellance – and yet in the 1840s it became the cause of a deadly moral and theological crisis. The main issue was this - just how literally are the words of the Bible to be interpreted by believers? And specifically, how literally should passages about slavery be interpreted? The Bible’s words about slavery - and how scholars and clergy in the North or South interpreted them - caused an immense theological controversy in a very religious America. Not only was the Bible unable to provide clear guidance in our country’s most difficult time, but it actually helped divide the United States even more. • One previously skeptical Confederate surgeon came to a chaplain to ask for prayer, saying he’d finally become a believer. He had noticed a clear difference between the deaths of believers and unbelievers, finally pulling out and reading a little-used Bible his mother had given him, seeking answers. He told the chaplain “I came here tonite resolved to accept publicly the invitation of the Gospel … Oh that I had submitted my stubborn heart to God years ago! I thank God that I am spared to bear testimony tonite that Christ is able and willing to save the worst of sinners.” Fourth, pre-war denominational divisions paved the way for national division. As a devout country divided economically and socially, it also grew farther apart religiously. By 1845, the red-hot rhetoric over slavery had caused splits in America’s three largest religious denominations (Baptists, Methodists, and Presbyterians) – all in essence over the contentious issue of slavery or non-slavery. Their divisions paved the way for the decisions of 1860 - since 94% of the South belonged to one of those three denominations. Soldiers went into militias and military camps fired up with religious rhetoric and fiery sermons – which rationalized their motives (Southern or Northern), and inflamed their sectarian biases. Battle flags and cannons were consecrated by prayer. Confederate Bishop-General William Pendleton even named his four artillery pieces “Matthew, Mark, Luke and John!” Troops were blessed before leaving on trains, and several “Preacher’s Regiments” were even formed. On both sides, but in the South especially, clergy led the way into the War. • Henry Clay - not a practicing Christian most of his life - joined the Protestant Episcopal Church in 1847. His final years were devoted to efforts of pacification and compromise. Clay seems to have brooded frequently over the political consequences of church schisms. Before his 1852 death, he said “I tell you, this sundering of the religious ties which have hitherto bound our people together, I consider the greatest source of danger to our country. If our religious men cannot live together in peace, what can be expected of us politicians, very few of whom profess to be governed by the great principles of love?” https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/cwbr/vol21/iss2/3 DOI: 10.31390/cwbr.21.2.03 2 Miller: Religion and Faith – the Forgotten Factor of the Civil War Fifth, the greatest morale-booster for soldiers was their faith in God. In March 1865, Col. Samuel Walkup (48th NC) lamented the long odds facing the Confederate cause – “The sea before us, the mountains on each side, behind us a mighty and desperate enemy. Where can we look for help but upwards.” Indeed, during the deadly War, it was religion more than any other factor which increased soldiers’ capacity to endure the conflict and battle stress that raged around them. Religious faith strongly motivated the attitudes of an enormous number of soldiers —as many as three-quarters took faith very seriously, by one estimate. Although there were never enough, Civil War chaplains labored valiantly for soldiers - the best ones becoming jacks-of-all-trades ministering to a wide variety of needs both spiritual and material. Non-ordained colporteurs distributed religious literature. Bibles in many forms were carried and used by soldiers. Religious services were held as regularly as possible, given the unexpected demands of army life. One southern soldier spoke of the key role faith played during the Civil War: “religious sanction was demanded by the righteous, approved by the lukewarm, and tolerated by the wicked. All felt better to have had the blessing of the church.” Sixth, perhaps half of all soldiers were touched by war-time revivals. By 1863, the Civil War had lasted longer and been far more deadly than anyone had expected. Horrendous battles like Shiloh and Antietam only led to more battles, without an end in sight. Thus, “driven to their knees by the realization that they had nowhere else to go,” it was no surprise that an immense religious revival broke out. Soldiers North and South, black and white, Eastern and Western theaters, were affected. These intense revivals caused a huge surge in attendance at religious services, with thousands of soldiers formally converting and joining “the Lord’s army” for the first time, including such wartime converts as McClellan, Bragg, Ewell, Hood, Cheatham, Joseph Johnson and Jefferson Davis. Bloody battles like Gettysburg led to even greater numbers of conversions, as one soldier testified - “I never prayed until last night; when I saw that [Christian] man die so happy, I determined to seek religion too.” A strong argument can be made that these Confederate revivals actually extended the War another year – so strong was the uplifting effect of faith upon their morale in the desperate last days of the War.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Religious Authorities in the Military and Civilian Control
    PASXXX10.1177/0032329216638063Politics & SocietyLevy 638063research-article2016 Article Politics & Society 2016, Vol. 44(2) 305 –332 Religious Authorities © 2016 SAGE Publications Reprints and permissions: in the Military and Civilian sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0032329216638063 Control: The Case of the pas.sagepub.com Israeli Defense Forces Yagil Levy The Open University of Israel Abstract This article takes a step toward filling the gap in the scholarly literature by examining the impact of religious intervention in the military on civil-military relations. Using the case of Israel, I argue that although the subordination of the Israeli military to elected civilians has remained intact, and the supreme command has been mostly secular, external religious authorities operate within the formal chain of command and in tandem with the formal authorities, managing the military affairs. This religious influence is apparent in three major domains: (1) the theological influence on military deployment, (2) the exclusion of women from equal participation in military service, and (3) the role expansion of the Military Rabbinate as a quasi-state agency and its reflection in the socialization of secular soldiers and the development of alternative military ethics. Consequently, extra-institutional control of the military is at work. Keywords civilian control, extra-institutional control, military ethics, military service, religionization, theology Corresponding Author: Yagil Levy, Open University of Israel, Ra’anana 43107, Israel. Email: [email protected] Downloaded from pas.sagepub.com by guest on April 28, 2016 306 Politics & Society 44(2) Over the years, relations between religious communities and the military have changed in many industrialized democracies.
    [Show full text]
  • Sunni Suicide Attacks and Sectarian Violence
    Terrorism and Political Violence ISSN: 0954-6553 (Print) 1556-1836 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/ftpv20 Sunni Suicide Attacks and Sectarian Violence Seung-Whan Choi & Benjamin Acosta To cite this article: Seung-Whan Choi & Benjamin Acosta (2018): Sunni Suicide Attacks and Sectarian Violence, Terrorism and Political Violence, DOI: 10.1080/09546553.2018.1472585 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/09546553.2018.1472585 Published online: 13 Jun 2018. Submit your article to this journal View related articles View Crossmark data Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=ftpv20 TERRORISM AND POLITICAL VIOLENCE https://doi.org/10.1080/09546553.2018.1472585 Sunni Suicide Attacks and Sectarian Violence Seung-Whan Choi c and Benjamin Acosta a,b aInterdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Herzliya, Israel; bInternational Institute for Counter-Terrorism, Herzliya, Israel; cPolitical Science, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA ABSTRACT KEY WORDS Although fundamentalist Sunni Muslims have committed more than Suicide attacks; sectarian 85% of all suicide attacks, empirical research has yet to examine how violence; Sunni militants; internal sectarian conflicts in the Islamic world have fueled the most jihad; internal conflict dangerous form of political violence. We contend that fundamentalist Sunni Muslims employ suicide attacks as a political tool in sectarian violence and this targeting dynamic marks a central facet of the phenomenon today. We conduct a large-n analysis, evaluating an original dataset of 6,224 suicide attacks during the period of 1980 through 2016. A series of logistic regression analyses at the incidence level shows that, ceteris paribus, sectarian violence between Sunni Muslims and non-Sunni Muslims emerges as a substantive, signifi- cant, and positive predictor of suicide attacks.
    [Show full text]
  • The Role of Religion in Peacebuilding in Conflict-Torn Society in Southeast Asia
    Religious Peacebuilders: The Role of Religion in Peacebuilding in Conflict-Torn Society in Southeast Asia Raja Juli Antoni A thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at The University of Queensland in 2014 School of Political Science and International Studies Abstract Scholars and practitioners of International Relations and Peace and Conflict Resolution Studies tend to ignore religion in their analyses due to the considerable influence of the secularist paradigm within these fields. Religion tends to be perceived as a cause of violent conflict, and hence as a phenomenon that must be relegated to the private sphere. However, against these more conventional approaches, some scholars and practitioners have begun to approach religion as a factor that can potentially shape peace and security in positive ways. Within this context, the aim of this thesis is to investigate, as its core question, how Muslims and Christians use religious resources to contribute to peacebuilding in conflict-torn societies in Southeast Asia. To answer the research question, the notions of the ambivalence of the sacred (AoS) and the hermeneutics of peace (HoP) are employed as theoretical frames for moving beyond both the core assumptions of the secularist paradigm and analysing local dynamics in the field. These local dynamics are accessed through a qualitative case study methodology with particular reference to the conflicts in Maluku (Indonesia) and Mindanao (the Philippines). This thesis includes the argument that religion is a resource for peacebuilding through the complex process of the HoP: the process of rereading sacred texts, religious doctrines, and narratives in order to create new, inclusive, and peaceful religious meanings and practices to overcome violent conflicts.
    [Show full text]
  • Terror in the Name of Islam - Unholy War, Not Jihad Parvez Ahmed
    Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law Volume 39 Issue 3 2007-2008 2008 Terror in the Name of Islam - Unholy War, Not Jihad Parvez Ahmed Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/jil Part of the International Law Commons Recommended Citation Parvez Ahmed, Terror in the Name of Islam - Unholy War, Not Jihad, 39 Case W. Res. J. Int'l L. 759 (2008) Available at: https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/jil/vol39/iss3/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Journals at Case Western Reserve University School of Law Scholarly Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law by an authorized administrator of Case Western Reserve University School of Law Scholarly Commons. TERROR IN THE NAME OF ISLAM-UNHOLY WAR, NOT JIHAD Parvez Ahmeaf t Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signi- fies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all, in any war, it is humanity hanging true sense. Under the1 cloud of threatening from a cross of iron. I. INTRODUCTION The objective of this paper is to (1) analyze current definitions of terrorism, (2) explore the history of recent terrorism committed in the name of Islam, (3) posit causal links between terrorism and the United States' (U.S.) Cold War programs and policies towards the Middle East, and (4) propose remedies to minimize and preferably eliminate the threat of terror- ism.
    [Show full text]
  • Religious Wars and Religious Tolerance
    DUŠAN PAJIN University of Arts in Belgrade DOI 10.5937/kultura1340044P UDK 316.647.5:2(091) 2-763/.769 172.4:2 originalan naučni rad RELIGIOUS­PLURALISM­–­ RELIGIOUS WARS AND RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE Abstract:­One­of­the­permanent­paradoxes­of­human­history­is­that­ during­several­thousand­years­religious­pluralism­was­one­of­the­major­ causes­ of­ conflicts­ and­ wars­ and­ a­ challenge­ for­ eventual­ religious­ tolerance,­which­seemed­to­be­just­a­well-wishing­attempt­(that­could­ not­ be­ permanently­ established,­ so­ far).­ Thus,­ one­ can­ follow­ two­ lines­–­the­history­of­religious­conflicts­and­wars,­and­the­history­of­ (religious)­ tolerance­ (or­ standpoints­ which­ advocate­ tolerance,­ in­ particular­religious­tolerance).­Although­one­can­find­examples­of­ideas­ of­tolerance­in­various­times­and­cultures,­one­can­also­find­religious­ conflicts­and­wars­repeating­in­various­times­and­cultures,­from­very­ ancient­times,­to­present­day. Key­ words:­ Religious­ wars,­ religious­ tolerance,­ pluralism,­ fundamentalism,­multiculturalism­ In many (or most) cases conflicts, or wars, which had religious excuses or labels, were not primarily motivated by religious motifs or ideas, but were (actually) fight for power, or economic benefits (although, in many cases, this was kept under the cover of “higher”, religious goals, or labels). For this reason, someone might try to classify pure religious wars (where motivation had no other source), from religious wars which had also other motives. However, it seems impossible – in actual cases – to clearly make such division, because religion itself was intermingled with power politics, economy, ethnicity, culture etc. The second peculiar issue is that religious conflicts and wars were: 44 DUŠAN PAJIN ­ sometimes inflicted within the same religious traditions (Judaism, Christian, Muslim), related to some differences of belief, ­ and sometimes between different religions, or members (nations, armies) of various religions.
    [Show full text]
  • Manning, Roger B. "Holy Wars, Crusades, and Religious Wars." War and Peace in the Western Political Imagination: from Classical Antiquity to the Age of Reason
    Manning, Roger B. "Holy Wars, Crusades, and Religious Wars." War and Peace in the Western Political Imagination: From Classical Antiquity to the Age of Reason. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016. 105–180. Bloomsbury Collections. Web. 25 Sep. 2021. <http:// dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781474258739.ch-003>. Downloaded from Bloomsbury Collections, www.bloomsburycollections.com, 25 September 2021, 06:12 UTC. Copyright © Roger B. Manning 2016. You may share this work for non-commercial purposes only, provided you give attribution to the copyright holder and the publisher, and provide a link to the Creative Commons licence. 3 Holy Wars, Crusades, and Religious Wars Th en standing inside the gate of the camp, he said: If any man be on the Lord’s side let him join with me. And all the sons of Levi gathered themselves together unto him. And he said to them: Th us saith the Lord God of Israel: Put every man his sword upon his thigh: go, and return from gate to gate through the midst of the camp, and let every man kill his brother, friend and neighbour. And the sons of Levi did according to the words of Moses, and there were slain that day about three and twenty thousand men. Exodus 32:26–8 And the Lord said to the servant: Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be fi lled. Gospel of St. Luke, 14:23 When the sacred months are passed, kill the idolaters wherever you fi nd them, and lie in wait for them in every place of ambush; but if they repent, pray regularly, and give the alms tax, then let them go their way, for God is forgiving, merciful.
    [Show full text]
  • Martyrdom, Suicide, and the Islamic Law of War: a Short Legal History
    \\server05\productn\F\FIN\27-1\FIN102.txt unknown Seq: 1 31-DEC-03 14:19 MARTYRDOM, SUICIDE, AND THE ISLAMIC LAW OF WAR: A SHORT LEGAL HISTORY Bernard K. Freamon* INTRODUCTION Religion is the mother of war. Conflicts involving religion are among the most intractable of human disputes. Yet, until recently, wars motivated or influenced by religious ideologies have been confined to small well-defined theaters. Europe’s Thirty Years War, which ended in 1648, appears to be the only exception in the modern history of warfare.1 Indeed, in the last three millennia the world has seen much war but it has not seen a full-scale religious war of global proportions since the end of the Crusades. There is reason to believe that this state of affairs is about to change. The horrific attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, as well as the Western military incursion in Afghanistan, the invasion and conquest of Iraq, and continuing Islamist guerilla attacks and terrorist violence against military and civilian targets in a variety of countries with signifi- cant Muslim populations makes one wonder whether the West2 * Professor of Law and Director, Program for the Study of Law in the Middle East, Seton Hall Law School. Professor Freamon is a Doctor in the Science of Law (JSD) candidate at Columbia Law School. Research support provided by the Seton Hall Law School Faculty Development Fund is gratefully acknowledged. Special gratitude is owed to George P. Fletcher for his vision in suggesting the pursuit of this topic and for his insightful comments on earlier drafts.
    [Show full text]
  • THE ROLE of RELIGION in CONFLICT and PEACE- BUILDING the British Academy Is the UK’S Independent National Academy Representing the Humanities and Social Sciences
    THE ROLE OF RELIGION IN CONFLICT AND PEACE- BUILDING The British Academy is the UK’s independent national academy representing the humanities and social sciences. For over a century it has supported and celebrated the best in UK and international research and helped connect the expertise of those working in these disciplines with the wider public. The Academy supports innovative research and outstanding people, informs policy and seeks to raise the level of public engagement with some of the biggest issues of our time, through policy reports, publications and public events. The Academy represents the UK’s research excellence worldwide in a fast changing global environment. It promotes UK research in international arenas, fosters a global approach across UK research, and provides leadership in developing global links and expertise. www.britishacademy.ac.uk The Role of Religion in Conflict and Peacebuilding September 2015 THE BRITISH ACADEMY 10 –11 Carlton House Terrace London SW1Y 5AH www.britiahacademy.ac.uk Registered Charity: Number 233176 © The British Academy 2015 Published September 2015 ISBN 978-0-85672-618-7 Designed by Soapbox, www.soapbox.co.uk Printed by Team Contents Acknowledgements iv Abbreviations v About the authors vi Executive summary 1 1. Introduction 3 2. Definitions 5 3. Methodology 11 4. Literature review 14 5. Case study I: Religion and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict 46 6. Case study II: Mali 57 7. Case study III: Bosnia and Herzegovina 64 8. Conclusions 70 9. Recommendations for policymakers and future research 73 10. Bibliography 75 Acknowledgements The authors are grateful to Leonie Fleischmann and Vladimir Kmec for their assistance in the preparation of this report and to Philip Lewis, Desislava Stoitchkova and Natasha Bevan in the British Academy’s international policy team.
    [Show full text]
  • Is “Identity-Based Conflict” a Valid Or Banal Concept? Event History Analysis of Civil War Onset, 1960-2000
    IS “IDENTITY-BASED CONFLICT” A VALID OR BANAL CONCEPT? EVENT HISTORY ANALYSIS OF CIVIL WAR ONSET, 1960-2000 DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Rumi Morishima Tosaka, M.A. ***** The Ohio State University 2008 Dissertation Committee: Approved by Professor Edward M. Crenshaw, Advisor Professor J. Craig Jenkins Professor Pamela M. Paxton __________________________________ Adviser Professor Janet M. Box-Steffensmeier Graduate Program in Sociology Copyright by Rumi Morishima Tosaka 2008 ABSTRACT One assumption that is often implicit yet widely held in the conflict literature is the existence of “identity-based (ethnic)” conflicts. While this type of conflict is presumed to be conceptually and empirically distinct from “non-identity” conflicts, few close examinations have been undertaken regarding the validity of this assumption. By using the conditional risk model, a Cox proportional hazard model that allows for multiple failures, this dissertation investigates whether or not the two war “types” evince different causal explanations in ways that can justify the oft-mentioned distinction. Results suggest that while the different “types” of war share many causes, economic exclusion seems more applicable to non-identity civil war (e.g., class-based warfare) while political exclusion better explains identity-based civil war overall, suggesting that there may be some truth to the argument that political recognition plays an important role in identity-based war. First, socioeconomic development and international economic integration seem generally important for war prevention, yet other aspects of modernization show different patterns across the “types” of civil war.
    [Show full text]
  • Impact of Religion on Military Operations and Strategic Implications
    USAWC CIVILIAN RESEARCH PROJECT Religious Advisement: Impact of Religion on Military Operations and Strategic Implications by Chaplain (Colonel) Alan F. Pomaville United States Army Dr. Sebastian L. Gorka Institute of World Politics Faculty Adviser Chaplain (Colonel) Jonathan E. Shaw USAWC Faculty Mentor This paper is submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the U.S. Army War College fellowship. The U.S. Army War College is accredited by the Commission on Higher Education of the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools, 3624 Market Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104, (215) 662-5606. The Commission on Higher Education is an institutional accrediting agency recognized by the U.S. Secretary of Education and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation. The views expressed in this student academic research paper are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Army, Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government. U.S. ARMY WAR COLLEGE CARLISLE BARRACKS, PENNSYLVANIA 17013 Religious Advisement: Impact of Religion on Military Operations and Strategic Implications Through the centuries, religion, religious beliefs, and ideologies held a prominent place in history and impacted billions of people. The core tenets of the faith of a people significantly influenced whether a country would experience peace, war, or other types of conflicts. Today religion and religious ideologies still affect our nation’s military operations and foreign affairs, with religious advisement a related Department of Defense (DoD) requirement. U.S. Department of Defense Directive 1304.19 requires military chaplains to “serve as the principal advisors to Commanders for all issues regarding the impact of religion on military operations.”1 This paper examines the impact of religion on military operations, with special attention to the role of religious advisement and the related issues of adversary empowerment and effective national strategy.
    [Show full text]
  • To What Extent Was the Protestant Reformation Responsible for the Witch-Hunts in the Years 1520-1650? by Dan Horn the Protestant
    To what extent was the Protestant Reformation responsible for the witch-hunts in the years 1520-1650? By Dan Horn The Protestant Reformation (1517-1648) initiated a period of doctrinal insecurity within the early modern mind. In challenging the carefully cultivated Medieval Catholic worldview, Protestant Reformers engendered drastic social, political and theological change to the very fabric of European society. Of particular importance among the new ideas of the Reformers was their increased emphasis on the Christian Bible as being the absolute word of God, to be read in the vernacular languages. This led to a rejection of the Catholic clerical hierarchy, with Papal authority being criticised as lacking a textual basis. Each man, according to the Reformers, was free to study and interpret the Bible unhindered by Priests, Bishops and Popes. However, the Reformation was not entirely theologically motivated. Many amongst the political elite of Europe saw the adoption of the Protestant Religion as a way of bypassing the high Papal taxation, and seizing the vast clerical wealth within their kingdoms. Religious fervour provoked a century of violent conflict, with the Thirty Years War (1618-1648) utterly devastating much of modern Germany, causing an estimated eight million casualties. The French Wars of Religion (1562-1598), brought about by the rise of Calvinism caused a traditionally pious Catholic society to utterly factionalise along Religious lines. Whilst fighting was inconsistent and regional, it resulted in the ruin of entire provinces. However, violence was not confined merely to warfare in this period. The historian Robin Briggs estimates that “some 40,000, to 50,000 people were executed as witches in Europe between roughly 1400 and 1750.”1 The role of the Reformation in these persecutions is contentious; there is much debate about the influence of organised Religion in their cause, as opposed to existing folk beliefs concerning witches.
    [Show full text]
  • The Coming of the LORD: an Analysis of Religious Rhetoric in the American Civil War Drake Smith Campbell University Faculty Mentor: Jaclyn Stanke Campbell University
    The Coming of the LORD: An Analysis of Religious Rhetoric in the American Civil War Drake Smith Campbell University Faculty Mentor: Jaclyn Stanke Campbell University ABSTRACT Propaganda has always served an important function in warfare. In the American Civil War, much of the propaganda of both the United States and the Confederacy utilized religion or religious rhetoric. A key aspect of the religiosity of both sides in the war was the notion of an all-powerful Providence that guided history as He saw ft, and while it was a powerful source of encouragement early in the war, as the death toll rose, it posed problems for many people, especially Southerners. The sermons and speeches delivered during the war demonstrate that political and religious rhetoric intermingled freely in churches, and show that political leaders eagerly claimed the favor of God on their causes. Each nation’s claims to divine favor refected distinctive views of God. The Union and Confederacy alike came to defne themselves through religion as well as politics, and they defned their opponents in the same ways. The North held itself to be a crusading force, striking down godless rebels who sought to overthrow rightful au- thority. By contrast, the South portrayed itself as an embattled defender of Christian tradition against invaders who were heretics at best, and infdels with no regard for Scripture at worst. he United States, being such a vast the Civil War in general, from the great Tcountry, has always had distinctive revival of the Confederate armies to the clash regional cultures, and by its very nature, over biblical interpretation.1 This paper, the American Civil War brought those however, aims to look at a narrower aspect differences to the fore, both highlighting and of this topic: the role of religious rhetoric as deepening them.
    [Show full text]